System and method for adding an advertisement to a personal communication

ABSTRACT

A system and method is provided for adding an advertisement to a digital message and providing additional communication data to a recipient that interacts with the advertisement regardless of the network device the recipient is utilizing. An advertisement generator residing on a network host accepts digital messages from contributors and allows the contributors to select an advertisement to be displayed with their contributed messages. These digital messages may be sent to specified recipients or published on a Web site. Using stored personal data associated with the contributor and with the recipient of a digital message, in addition to the content of the message itself, the advertisement generator suggests advertisements to be included with the digital messages based on their contextual relevance. In exchange for including an advertisement with a digital message, a contributor is compensated. If the contributor-selected advertisement is provided by a third party advertiser, the message, contributor, and advertisement data is utilized to compensate the contributor of that message for sending it to at least one recipient or posting it on a Web site. If the advertisement is interactive, and the advertisement is interacted with, the advertisement generator will provide the recipient with additional communication data in a format that can be understood by the recipient network device.

CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATION

This application is a continuation-in-part of U.S. patent applicationSer. No. 09/755,541, filed Jan. 5, 2001, which application claims thebenefit, pursuant to 35 U.S.C. §119(e), of U.S. provisional applicationSer. No. 60/174,781, filed Jan. 6, 2000.

COPYRIGHT NOTICE

This patent document contains material subject to copyright protection.The copyright owner, Anthony Rothschild, has no objection to thereproduction of this patent document or any related materials, as theyappear in the files of the Patent and Trademark Office of the UnitedStates or any other country, but otherwise reserves all rightswhatsoever.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

1. Field of the Invention

The present invention relates to advertising over a wide area networksuch as the Internet, and more particularly, to a system and method thatallows an Internet user to place an advertisement within a digitalmessage and to receive compensation for doing so.

2. Description of Related Art

The number of Internet users has been growing at an ever increasing rateover the past ten years. InternetWorldStats.com estimates that in 2007,the number of individuals worldwide who have access to the Internet is1.1 billion, with 211 million of those individuals residing in theUnited States. Businesses are aware of this growing audience and haveresponded, spending $12.1 billion on Internet advertising in 2005. Thisnumber is expected to double by 2010.

The rapid increase in the number of individuals who have Internet accesshas lead to, and may in part be attributed to, an increase in e-mailusage. In the United States, approximately 65% of Internet users areover the age of 14 and have active e-mail accounts. Studies have shownthat 90% of those e-mail users connect to the Internet primarily to viewand send e-mail. Additionally, 40% of those individuals stated thatchecking their e-mail was one of the first things they do in themorning, as well as one of the last things they do before going to bed.As these numbers suggest, the e-mail users, which worldwide areresponsible for generating 10 billion e-mail messages daily, arespending a great deal of time interacting with a medium that isrelatively untapped by the advertising industry.

In increasing numbers, Internet users are also turning to web logs, or“blogs,” to seek out special-interest information. One study estimatesthat there are more than 70 million active blogs available on theInternet, featuring news and commentary on a wide range of topics. Mostof these blogs also allow readers to post messages in reply to thehosted commentary. Other Web sites host digital bulletin boards or chatrooms in which users post digital messages discussing topics of mutualinterest. These digital messages are not limited to text; indeed,millions of users post audio, still images, and video on Web sitesfeaturing user-generated content in order to interact with an onlinecommunity of users with similar interests. These online communities withfocused interests are an appealing target for advertisers, who havebegun to recognize the potential of this medium.

With the amount of funds being spent on Internet marketing, it isimperative that those advertising campaigns produce profitable results.This requires advertising service providers to offer focused,result-driven, advertising methods. A basic premise to begin with isthat Internet advertisements must produce a positive association in theconsumers' mind with the advertised product. A negative association,which can be produced by advertising through unsolicited e-mail, notonly does not benefit the organization, but may actually harm it in thelong run. For example, if a business buys a list of e-mail addressesfrom an industry that has a similar customer base, the response they getfrom the recipient may have quite the opposite effect of that intended.Unsolicited e-mail messages, also referred to as spam or junk e-mail,may annoy the consumer so much that a negative connotation with theproduct is formed in the consumer's mind, thus reducing sales inoff-line markets through poor brand name association.

One way to avoid the negative association created through unsolicitede-mail advertisements is to advertise through solicited e-mails. Thatis, attach advertisements to standard e-mail messages (or othersolicited communications) that are being sent between individuals thathave a personal or professional relationship. Advertising in this manneris much less intrusive and appears to the recipient as a platform forthe message, instead of the message itself. There are currently at leastthree different business models that utilize solicited e-mail foradvertising. The first is the desired account method used by Hotmail™,which provides an Internet user with an e-mail address in exchange forplacing a Hotmail™ (or affiliate) interactive link within every e-mailmessage that originates from the account. The second is the banneradvertisement model, used, for example, by Yahoo™ mail and AIM™ mail,which displays advertisements on screen adjacent to message reading andcomposing panes so that users view advertisements while composingdigital messages and while reading digital messages. This third is theadvertisement attachment model, used at various times by Yahoo™ mail andHotmail™, which attaches an advertisement or advertising link referringto another of that company's Web sites or services to the bottom ofoutbound digital messages.

The desired account method allows a service such as Hotmail™ toadvertise itself to recipients of e-mail messages in exchange forproviding and maintaining an e-mail address. The reason this is referredto as the desired account method is due to the popularity of theHotmail™ name. Internet users prefer to have a Hotmail™ account overother similar accounts (e.g., Mail.com), which are also free, because ofthe name recognition associated with it.

There are three problems with an advertising service's using the desiredaccount method. First, there is a great deal of setup cost associatedwith a Web site capable of receiving, storing, and transmitting highquantities of data, as required by an e-mail service provider. Second,the advertiser would need brand name recognition capable of enticingInternet users to become e-mail subscribers, which may prove to be quitehard if the advertiser is not as well known (and attractively viewed) asHotmail™. Third, an Internet user that already has an e-mail accountwould be less inclined to sign up for a second one, which would forcethe Internet user to monitor and maintain multiple e-mail accounts.

Other mail services provide an Internet user with an e-mail account inexchange for placing interactive advertisement links within every e-mailmessage that originates from the account. Additionally, users may agreeto view banner advertisements that pop up while the user is composing orreading digital messages using the network server. The Internet user mayalso be rewarded by receiving free services or through a point system ifthe advertisement is deemed successful. The points can later be redeemedthrough the Web site for merchandise or money. By compensating Internetusers for using such a service, businesses that don't have the brandname recognition can pay to have their advertisements included insolicited e-mails.

There are four problems with advertisers using the methods describedabove. First, Internet users that already have an e-mail account wouldbe less inclined to sign up for a second one, which would force theInternet user to monitor and maintain multiple e-mail accounts. Second,in the absence of any subscription questionnaire (which would provideonly minimal information anyway), the advertiser would have no idea whatdemographic is going to be exposed to the advertisement or whether therecipient of the e-mail will be a consumer that would be inclined topurchase the advertising product. For example, advertisements for datingservices could be sent to married couples, which provides the advertiserwith little benefit. This leads to the third problem, given that theadvertisements are placed at random, the recipient may be offended bythe advertisement, thus creating a negative association with theproduct. Not only does this reflect poorly on the advertiser, but italso reflects poorly on the sender of the e-mail, possibly discouragingfuture use of such a service. For example, advertisements for McDonaldscorporation could be viewed as offensive if they are sent to a Hindu.Fourth, when the advertisers realize the problems associated with such asystem, they will only pay the Internet users for advertisements thatprove to be successful (e.g., the recipient interacts with theadvertisement or makes a purchase). However, this is rather unfair tothe Internet user when you consider that 40% of people who purchase aproduct after they view an online advertisement do so between eight andthirty days after seeing the advertisement.

Another method of Internet advertising that may avoid the negativeassociations created by unsolicited e-mails is targeting advertising tothe special interests of the users of a particular blog, online socialnetwork, or online bulletin board. For example, Edmunds™ and KelleyBluebook™ host a number of online bulletin boards allowing users to postmessages discussing automobiles. Advertisements for auto parts,automobile magazines, and automotive accessories placed on these siteslikely find a receptive audience among the users of these bulletinboards, reducing the risk that an advertiser would alienate or offendpotential customers. However, selecting an advertisement based on thegeneral topic of the blog or bulletin board may still result inadvertisements that are of little interest to a large number of users.Accordingly, it would be desirable to tailor advertising more narrowlyto individual users or small groups of users to increase the probabilitythat they will interact with the advertisement and ultimately purchaseadvertised products.

From the above discussion, it is clear that an Internet advertisementservice provider should appeal to the user of the online content, theprovider of the online content, and the advertiser in order to beeffective in the marketplace. In order to appeal to an e-mail recipient,an e-mail message containing an advertisement should be solicited. Thus,it would be preferable if the e-mail message came from someone therecipient knew, either personally or professionally, and the content ofthe e-mail message was not primarily related to the advertisement.Likewise, to appeal to a blog reader, online social network user, orbulletin-board user, an advertisement should appeal to that user'sparticular background and interests.

In order for an Internet advertisement service provider to appeal to acontributor of online content, the contributor should be adequatelycompensated for his trouble. This would include compensating thecontributor for the mere presence of an advertisement in a digitalcommunication (whether that communication be e-mail, chat-room dialog,instant messaging, blog postings, Really Simple Syndication (RSS) feeds,online social network messages, etc.). This compensation would beincreased if the advertisement was interacted with and/or purchases weremade. Additionally, an e-mail service should work in conjunction with asender's existing e-mail address, thus enabling the sender to only haveto monitor and maintain one e-mail account. Finally, the contentcontributor should be able to choose which advertisements (oradvertising entities) are to be included in his digital message. Forexample, this would allow a person with an interest in sports to attacha Nike™ advertisement to his message, thus portraying himself as anathletically minded individual, much like one does when one wears at-shirt containing the Nike™ logo.

Finally, an Internet advertisement service provider would appeal to anadvertiser if the end product produced advertisements that were placedbefore interested consumers. By presenting the contributor of a digitalmessage with a palette of relevant advertisements and giving thecontributor the ability to choose which advertisements should beincorporated within his digital messages, the advertisement getsdisplayed before the contributor, who is most likely a consumer of theadvertised product, and before a user of that digital message, who, byassociation, is more likely than not to also share the same interests asthe contributor. Additionally, the advertising service should be capableof distributing e-mails and advertisements to recipients operating onnon-traditional Internet devices (e.g., mobile phones or other wirelessdevices). The service should also be flexible enough to adapt to changeswithin the on-line advertising industry.

Thus, a need exists for a system that incorporates computer-assisteduser control over the selection of advertisements to be associated withdigital messages, that compensates contributors for their carefulselection of a relevant advertisement, and that makes digital messagescontaining advertisements available to consumers using a variety ofnetwork devices to access digital content.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

The present invention provides a system and method for allowing acontributor of a digital message to add an advertisement to the digitalmessage and providing additional communication data to a recipient thatinteracts with the advertisement regardless of the network device therecipient is utilizing (e.g., personal computer, television set-top box,telephone, consumer appliance, PDA, WAP mobile phone, I-Mode mobilephone, 3G device, WED, WID, Digital Broadcast device, WiMax, DigitalVideo Broadcast (DVB) systems, game console, GPS, networked multi-mediadevices, etc.). In an embodiment of the present invention, a sendernetwork device, a recipient network device, and a Web site are connectedto, and can communicate through a communication network, such as theInternet, a local area network, a wide area network, or a digitalbroadcast system. The sender network device communicates with anadvertising application operating on a network application server tosend a personal communication containing a sender-selected advertisementto the recipient network device or to post that message on the networkapplication server for multiple users to view. The displayedadvertisement may be selected by the contributor, or may be selected bythe advertising application, or a combination of the two, making use ofone or more registered users' profile data, to narrowly tailor theadvertisements to be of mutual interest to both the contributor and theuser. If the user interacts with the advertisement, the advertisingapplication provides the user network device with additionalcommunication data and the contributor with compensation.

To create a digital message containing a contributor-selectedadvertisement, the contributor network device communicates with theadvertising application operating on a network application server or Website. If it is the first time the contributor is communicating with theserver, the contributor may be asked to register on the server, whereregistration data and an associated unique identification number isstored in a memory device. Thereafter the contributor will have anopportunity to enter message data (e.g., recipient data, subject data,message content data, and file attachment data) and select anadvertisement that will be included along with the message data to beposted or sent to a designated recipient. The sender may choose anadvertisement from a sender-created palette of advertisements or from alist of available advertisements divided into searchable categories.When the sender indicates that the message is ready to be posted orsent, the advertising application is presented with message data(pertaining to the digital message), contributor data (pertaining to thecontributor or sender), and advertisement data (pertaining to thecontributor-selected advertisement). The advertising application thenassigns a unique identification number to the message data, aspreviously done for the sender data (upon registration) andadvertisement data (upon submission), and stores the data in the servermemory device. The advertising application then utilizes the messagedata, sender data and advertisement data to format a digital messagecontaining a sender-selected advertisement, which is then posted (e.g.,in the context of a blog, other web-based bulletin board service, orother server of user-generated content), or sent to a designatedrecipient (such as by e-mail, instant message, blog post, online socialnetwork comment, multi-user chat, etc.).

Alternatively, the advertising application may scan the content of adigital message that has been created and suggest advertisements toinclude with the digital message based on the content and subject matterof the particular message. The contributor would then be able to pick asuggested advertisement or set of advertisements to be included with themessage. The advertising application will default to the advertisementwith the best contextual match in the event that the contributor doesnot express a preference. Thus the contributor of the digital messagemay select an advertisement independently, may make a selection from aset of advertisements pre-selected by the advertising application basedon the content of the message or the saved profile of the intendedrecipient, or may allow the advertising application to select theadvertisement to be included with the digital message.

Like the contributors, the users (readers) of a server hosting a blog orother user-generated content may be asked to register the first timethey access the site and will be asked to register in order to postreply messages. At registration, users will be asked to providedemographic data and, optionally, to indicate some of their interests.This information will be saved in the advertising application as a userprofile. Subsequently, as the user posts reply messages or searches forcontent on the Web site, such information will be saved in the userprofile to build up an increasingly detailed database of that user'sinterests in order to accurately predict what types of advertising willappeal to that user. By allowing a contributor to select from a paletteof advertisements he believes would be interesting to his readers, andthen allowing the advertising application to further select theparticular advertisement from that set that will be displayed to a givenuser based on the saved user profile, a good alignment of the interestsof the contributor and the user may be achieved by combining human andmachine selection mechanisms. Thus, despite the fact that a posteddigital message is not a direct personal e-mail to particular recipient,a comparable degree of alignment of interest may be achievednotwithstanding the more public nature of a posted digital message. Thisalignment will likely increase the probability that an advertisementwill appeal to the reader.

Advertisements and additional communication data can be provided by thecontributor of the digital message, third party advertisers, or the Website. If the sender-selected advertisement is provided by a third partyadvertiser, then the sender of that advertisement is compensated forsending it to at least one recipient or for posting it on a bulletinboard. Additional compensation may be awarded to the sender if arecipient or user interacts with the advertisement or goes on topurchase a good or service from the third party advertiser. The message,sender, and advertisement data allow the advertising application todetermine the compensation due to a particular contributor of digitalcontent.

In addition, advertising content may be provided by the contributor of adigital message who views an advertisement somewhere else on theInternet and desires to include that advertisement with his digitalmessage. In this way, the palette of advertisements from which thecontributor may choose would extend to any advertising material that hasbeen distributed on the Internet, regardless of format. The advertisingcould comprise text, images, video, audio, or any other digital formatsknown in the art. Advertisers that are interested in distributing theiradvertisements this way would submit registration data to theadvertising application, including compensation data, preferred audiencedemographic data, preferred audience location data, advertisementexpiration dates, and other relevant information. A contributor to ablog or social network or the sender of an e-mail would copy or dragsuch an advertisement from another location on the Internet over to theadvertisement generator to allow the advertisement to be attached to hisdigital message. The advertisement generator would access thecompensation data provided by owner of the advertisement and check theexpiration dates and target demographic and location data to verify thatthe advertisement is appropriate for attachment to the contributor'sdigital message. If so, the advertisement generator would attach theadvertisement to the digital message and arrange for the contributor tobe compensated according to the terms provided by the advertisementowner.

A contributor would also be permitted to tag an advertisement appearingsomewhere on the Internet in order to use it with a digital message orsave it for use with a future digital message and to save a reference tothe advertisement in the advertising palette managed by the advertisingapplication. Upon locating a desired advertisement on the Internet, thecontributor would tag it by creating a bookmark containing a link to theadvertisement's URL along with metadata that the contributor couldupdate to include comments or a short description that would besearchable. The advertising application would then incorporate thetagged advertisement as part of the advertising palette presented to thecontributor, allowing the contributor to select and include theadvertisement with a later digital message.

An exemplary method of assuring that this system is operable with avariety of network devices is to utilize the Web site'splatform-independent architecture, which is developed using a device-and data-neutral software language, such as XML (Extensible MarkupLanguage), along with an advertising application divided into separateoutput and data processing stages. When a user interacts with aninteractive advertisement, the request data (contained in theadvertisement's embedded URL) calls to the data processing layer. Thedata processing layer uses the request data (which may contain messagedata that is linked to sender data and advertisement data) to retrievedata from the Web site memory device. A portion of the retrieved data isthen passed on to the output stage, where it is placed in a templatethat has been optimized for the targeted recipient network device.

One method of implementing a system to insert user-selectedadvertisements into digital messages and to compensate contributors fordoing so is to use an advertising application running on a networkapplication server. A user will log into the application running on thenetwork server to compose or upload a digital message. The advertisingapplication will then process information including user-profile dataabout the contributor, contextual information contained in the digitalmessage, user-profile data about the recipient if available, andlocation information about the contributor and recipient if available,and will present the contributor with a palette of possibleadvertisements that have a higher degree of contextual relevance to thedigital messaging exchange. In order to create this palette, theadvertising application will use a ranking algorithm to perform amulti-dimensional fit across a broad set of parameters. These parametersmay include demographic data about the contributor and recipient;geographical data about the contributor and recipient which may bedetermined by GPS, A-GPS, or other mobile wireless network location datain the case of mobile devices and Internet network-location data in thecase of TCP/IP-networked devices; contextual data pulled from thecontents of the digital message; and historical data aboutadvertisements selected by the contributor in the past. The advertisingapplication will then allow the contributor to select a preferredadvertisement from this machine-generated palette for inclusion with thedigital message. The contributor will also be allowed to customize thepalette by adding or removing advertisements that the machine algorithmmay or may not have selected. The advertising application will thenformat the digital message to include the selected advertisement, andthe formatted message will be sent to the selected recipient or postedto the desired blog, online social network, bulletin board, multi-userchat platform, or other user-content server. The advertising applicationwill then compensate the contributor of the digital message forincluding an advertisement. This compensation may take the form of adiscounted or free service, such as an e-mail service or blog hostingservice; a payment of points that are redeemable for goods or services;a cash payment; free software; a free or discounted telecommunicationsservice, such as text messaging; a free or discounted audio or videodownload; or any other good or service given in exchange for thecontributor's agreement to include an advertisement with his digitalmessage.

As described above, geographic data may be useful in targeting certaintypes of advertisements. For example, a mobile phone user may becompensated for sending a digital message and including an advertisementfor a local restaurant along with his digital message. As anotherexample, geographic location data could be used to select advertisementsfor tickets to events occurring in the recipient's local area. The GPSor other location-identifying features of the recipient's mobile phoneor other network device could be used by the advertising application tocustomize the advertising palette presented to the contributor toinclude advertisements of local relevance.

The advertising palette itself may be organized as a two-dimensionalmatrix that makes it simple for a contributor to use. For example,advertised products may be listed along a first axis with marketsegments listed along a second axis. A single product thus might havemany advertisements associated with it depending on geographic,demographic, or particular interests of the target recipient. Forexample, the marketing of a specific model of the Apple iPod™ productrange might utilize very different advertisements targeted towarddifferent demographic groups. An advertisement for an over-50 audiencemight emphasize sound quality and depict classical music, while that foran under-30 audience might emphasize portability and depict rock or rapmusic. An advertising palette organized in this manner is simple for auser to navigate and allows a large variety of advertisements to bepresented to the user for selection. Furthermore, such a palette wouldallow the contributor of a digital message to select an advertisementfor a certain product and allow the advertisement generator to selectthe particular version of the advertisement to be displayed based ondemographic or other data regarding the recipient of that message. Forexample, a contributor to a blog might decide to advertise an AppleiPod™ with his posted message. He would select the iPod™ advertisementfrom the palette and enable the advertisement generator to select theparticular advertisement from among those directed to various marketsegments. When a registered user logged into the blog to read thecontributor's comment, the advertisement generator would select anddisplay the particular advertisement that was matched to that user'sdemographic data. If the user was not registered, or demographic datawas not available, the advertisement generator would display a defaultadvertisement.

An advertiser network device may also be connected to the Internet, thusenabling advertisers to upload advertisements and additionalcommunication data to the network application server. Additionally,advertisers may be allowed to gather statistical data based upon aparticular advertisement campaign. A staff network device may also beconnected to the Internet, thus enabling a staff member to maintain theWeb site and derive system intelligence.

This system may also be used by a professional marketing staff, by mediabuyers, or by advertising agencies to quickly and efficiently selectadvertisements for an online media campaign. The invention provides themarketer with access to a network application server including adatabase of advertisements and tools for efficiently insertingadvertisements, monitoring compensation, and managing the campaignwithout having to invest in technical tools.

The advertising application described above is able to process digitalmessages and advertisements that take on a wide variety of formats. Forexample, the advertisement may take the form of a digital audio filethat is attached to a digital message that may be posted or sent to adesignated recipient. When the recipient reads the digital message usinga recipient network device, the audio advertisement will be played overthe audio channel of the recipient network device. The selection of theaudio advertisement will be under the control of the sender of themessage, but the advertising application will suggest advertisementsbased on the content and subject matter of the personal communication oron the personal interests of the recipient, if the recipient is aregistered user of the Web site with data in a saved personal profile.If the sender does not express a preference as to the advertisement tobe included, the advertising application will default to that with theclosest contextual match.

The digital message or the advertisement may also take other forms. Forexample, the digital message may be in the form of a text message,comment, article, or other submission that includes an advertisementdisplayed in close proximity to the text. The digital message may alsobe in the form of a digital audio file that the contributor places onthe network server and which is either made available for download byusers, or is made available for streaming over the Internet such that auser may listen to the digital audio message while connected to thenetwork server. The advertising application would insert acontributor-selected audio advertisement into the contributed audio filesuch that the advertisement is played to the user before the contributedaudio content is played. A contributor may also provide data in the formof voice over Internet protocol (VOIP) packets that are streamed overthe Internet to an intended recipient. In this case, an audioadvertisement may be inserted into the audio stream. A contributor mayalso post content in the form of a digital video file or digital videostream. In this case, the contributor will select a video advertisementto be inserted into the contributed video content such that a user willview the video advertisement before viewing the contributed digitalvideo. The posted video files may be made available for download byusers visiting a Web site, may be streamed over the Internet to allow auser to watch the video while remaining connected to the Web site, ormay be embedded in some other form of digital content such as a blog ora mashup. The contributed digital content may also take the form ofdigital photographs or images to be shared with other users of the Website. Again, the contributor will select an advertisement to bedisplayed along with the contributed images such that users will be ableto access both the contributed images and the selected advertisement. Insum, the digital message may take the form of any type of digitalcontent, including text, images, video, or audio, and the advertisementlikewise may take the form of any digital content. An advertisement inany format may be combined with a digital message in any format, so longas the recipient or user ends up with access to both the advertisementand the digital message.

Due to bandwidth limitations and the increasing quality and size ofvideo, audio, and image data, users are increasingly likely to send ahyperlink to a location displaying a given piece of data rather thansending the data itself. Thus, a user wanting to share a particularvideo clip with friends may post the clip to a server and then send ane-mail message to friends with a link pointing to the location of thevideo on the Internet. The advertising application, running on theserver hosting the digital content, can take advantage of this to targetan advertisement to the users identified by the contributor of thecontent. When the contributor of a digital video sends a link tofriends, he will have the option of selecting an advertisementspecifically targeted to the recipients of his message. If recipientsare registered users of the server, the advertising application cansuggest an advertisement based on user's profile, and the sender canselect which advertisement to send to each recipient of the link. When arecipient of an e-mail message containing a link follows that link toaccess the video stored on the server, the advertising application willinsert the selected advertisement into the video stream such that theuser will first view the advertisement and then be able to view theshared video. A novel aspect of this invention over the prior art isthat the contributor has control over the content that is combined withor inserted into his digital message, thus adding value by preciselytargeting interests of the intended viewer or recipient.

The system for inserting advertisements into digital content alsoapplies to messages or digital content provided to registered recipientsof the digital content who have agreed to provide demographic or otherpersonal data in order to receive the digital content andadvertisements. In return for providing demographic data and currentlocation data, if available, and accepting advertisements selected bythe contributor of the digital content, such users are given access tothe contributor's digital message or content. Such advertising can bebetter targeted to the recipient based upon the the demographic andlocation data provided by the recipient, the recipient's statedpreferences at the time of registration, subsequent updates to personalor demographic data, or the contributor's choice of advertising linkedto the content of the message.

Likewise, this system for inserting advertisements applies to sharedaudio files. When a user follows a link to access a shared audio file,the advertising application inserts an audio advertisement into theaudio clip such that the user must first listen to the advertisementbefore listening to the audio clip. Still images are handled in much thesame way. A contributor may choose to store a quantity of image files onan Internet server and may distribute links to friends and select anadvertisement that should be featured when each of them accesses thelink. In this case, the advertisement would be displayed alongside therequested still image, or may be superimposed over a portion of thestill image.

In other cases, a contributor might not send a link to digital contentdirectly, but might create a message comprising linked digital content,or post such a link in a blog, chat room, or other semi-public Internetspace. In that case, when a user attempts to follow a link from a blogor other site, the advertising application will be able to retrieve theInternet address of the referring site and display an advertisement thatis appropriately aligned with the interests of the users of that site.If users following the hyperlink are logged in to a Web site thatrequires registration, additional personal profile information may besent to the advertising application in order to further refine theselection of an advertisement that will likely appeal to that user.

In addition to selecting advertisements to be displayed alongsidedigital content, a contributor may also select an advertising logo orbrand name to be associated with his or her own personal identifyinginformation and to be displayed as part of a digital signatureidentifying the contributor of a particular digital message. Such anassociation of a brand name with the identity of a particularcontributor will serve as a personal endorsement of that brand orproduct and may be particularly effective in the context of an onlinecommunity or online social network in which users participate becausethey are already highly interested in what the other contributors haveto say. For example, users of online social networking sites, such asMySpace or Facebook, create digital signatures that may include aphotograph, symbol, or other visual representation of the identity theywish to present to other users of the online social network. Byselecting an advertising logo or brand name as part of their signature,users will receive compensation for posting messages displaying theselected advertisement.

This invention is also applicable in the context of virtual worldapplications, such as Second Life and Cyworld, in which users create avirtual personality, or avatar, that is displayed to other users. Theuser customizes or personalizes the avatar and its virtual “property”with items he wishes to share with or display to other users of thevirtual world. Such a user would be compensated for selecting anadvertisement to be displayed as part of the avatar or its virtualenvironment. Thus, real advertisements would be displayed to usersinteracting in this virtual world as they share their digital creations.These advertisements would not be limited to visual displays but mayinclude other multimedia (audio, video, and text) formats within thevirtual environment.

Just like primary contributors, users posting replies to content theyhave viewed on a blog, online social network, or other user-content siteare able to include advertisements in their responses. Though theirresponses are posted in a relatively public forum, they are primarilymessages directed to an author of digital content or to another user whohas posted a comment. Thus, the advertising application is able toselect appropriate advertisements based on the author of the message towhich a given user is replying. For example, when a user contributes areply to a blog post, that user is really sending a personal message tothe author of that blog, about whom the advertising application has agreat deal of information. The advertising application is thus able toselect an advertisement that is well matched to the interests of theprimary blog contributor and is thus more likely to be one with whichthe blog author will interact. The advertising application is thus ableto use such information to assemble a palette of advertisements fromwhich the user posting a reply may make a selection and receivecompensation for doing so.

The preceding discussion has presented an overview of a system foradding an advertisement to a digital communication in a way thatprovides certain advantages for advertisers and contributors of digitalmessages. A more complete understanding of this system will be affordedto those skilled in the art, as well as a realization of additionaladvantages and objects thereof, by a consideration of the followingdetailed description of the preferred embodiment. Reference will be madeto the appended sheets of drawings which will first be describedbriefly.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

FIG. 1 is a high level architectural drawing of a system that operatesin accordance with one embodiment of the present invention to send apersonal communication containing an advertisement to at least onerecipient over a network.

FIG. 2 is a diagram illustrating the primary components of the systemillustrated in FIG. 1.

FIG. 3 is a more detailed diagram depicting the advertising applicationand illustrating its interaction with servers hosting advertisements andservers hosting digital message content.

FIG. 4 is a flow chart depicting the process in which a contributor of adigital message engages to compose a message and select an advertisementto be included with it.

FIG. 5 depicts an exemplary embodiment of an advertising paletteillustrating advertisements classified by product type and target marketsegment.

FIG. 6 depicts an exemplary embodiment of an Internet advertisementtagging process, including a flow diagram showing how advertisements arecopied from the Internet to the advertising server.

FIG. 7 is a diagram illustrating an exemplary e-mail message containinga sender-selected advertisement.

FIG. 8. is a diagram illustrating an exemplary Web page utilized togather data for providing a recipient with an e-mail containing asender-selected advertisement.

FIG. 9 is a flow diagram illustrating how an advertising applicationgenerates and transmits an e-mail containing a sender-selectedadvertisement.

FIG. 10 is a diagram illustrating the primary components responsible forthe device and data neutral functionality of the system illustrated inFIG. 1, specifically the separation of data processing and data outputwithin an advertising application.

FIG. 11 is a flow diagram illustrating one method of providingadditional communication data to a recipient.

FIG. 12 is a diagram illustrating various software levels operating on awireless Internet device.

FIG. 13 is a high level architectural diagram illustrating a system thatoperates in accordance with one embodiment of the present invention touse an e-mail client operating on a mobile Internet device together withan application program operating on a Web site to provide a personalcommunication containing an advertisement to a recipient via theInternet.

FIG. 14 is a high level architectural diagram illustrating a system thatoperates in accordance with one embodiment of the present invention tosend a personal communication containing an advertisement to a recipientover a wireless network.

FIG. 15 is a flow diagram illustrating how a mobile client operating onan mobile sender device is used together with an application programoperating on a Web site to provide a personal communication containingan advertisement to a recipient.

FIG. 16 is a diagram illustrating an exemplary blog Web site in which ablog author selects an advertisement to be displayed alongsidecontributed comments, and readers may select an advertisement to bedisplayed with their posted responses.

FIG. 17 is a diagram illustrating an exemplary data-sharing Web site atwhich users may post multimedia content, including audio, video, andimage files, containing embedded advertisements, to share with otherusers.

FIG. 18 is a diagram illustrating an exemplary bulletin-board Web sitedepicting users who have identified themselves with certain brands orproducts in their digital signatures.

FIG. 19 is a data flow diagram depicting a contributor of digitalcontent and a user of that content interacting with an advertisingapplication hosted on a Web site.

FIG. 20 depicts the application of this invention to a virtual worldapplication in which a user is able to select real advertisements to bedisplayed in a virtual environment for other users to see and interactwith.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENT

The present invention provides a system and method for adding anadvertisement to a digital message, providing compensation to thecontributor of that message in exchange for adding an advertisement, andproviding additional communication data to a recipient that interactswith the advertisement regardless of the network device the recipient isutilizing. The advertisement may be selected by the contributor of thedigital message, by a contextual algorithm running on a networkapplication server, or by a combination of both. In the detaileddescription that follows, like element numerals are used to describelike elements illustrated in one or more figures. Various terms andacronyms are used throughout the detailed description, including thefollowing:

Application Program. Within the context of computer hardware andsoftware, an application program is a set of one or more computerprograms that performs a function when executed within a computerhardware device. If the set is comprised of plural programs, theprograms are coordinated to perform a function together; such programsmay individually perform other functions. Similarly, a program may becomprised of plural modules that perform certain functions individuallyand other functions when combined in various ways.

Internet. A collection of interconnected (public and/or private)networks that are linked together by a set of standard protocols (suchas TCP/IP and HTTP) to form a global, distributed network and which areconnected by fixed-line or wireless network devices. (While this term isintended to refer to what is now commonly known as the Internet, it isalso intended to encompass variations that may be made in the future,including changes and additions to existing standard protocols.) WebSite. A computer system that serves informational content over a networkusing the standard protocols of the World Wide Web. Typically, a Website corresponds to a particular Internet domain name and includes thecontent associated with a particular individual, business, ororganization.

Web Server. A device for transmitting data over the Internet (which mayalso prevent the transmission of data) encompassing thehardware/software server components that serve information content overa network and the “back end” hardware/software components, including anynon-standard or specialized components, that interact with the servercomponent to perform services for Web site users.

Network Application Server. The hardware and software components of aserver that receives, stores, sends, and makes available informationover network connections, including wired internet networks, wirelessnetworks, cellular networks, and other networks over which usersexchange information.

Blog. Also called a “web log.” A Web site containing entries, usually inreverse chronological order, submitted by one or more contributors on aregular basis, commenting on or providing information or commentaryabout a particular subject. In additional to textual content, many blogsinclude multimedia content, including audio, video, and still images.Most blogs also allow registered users to post reply messages to thecontent posted by the primary author or authors.

Mashup. An application that combines data from multiple sources. It maycomprise a Web site that includes content from multiple other Web sites,or it may comprise video from multiple sources combined to appear as asingle video.

The foregoing definitions are not intended to limit the scope of thepresent invention, but rather are intended to clarify terms that arewell understood by persons having ordinary skill in the art. It shouldbe appreciated that the defined terms may also have other meanings tosuch persons having ordinary skill in the art. These and other terms areused in the detailed description below.

Preferred embodiments of the present invention operate in accordancewith a plurality of network devices, such as a sender network device, arecipient network device, and a Web site. The sender network device, therecipient network device, and the Web site are coupled together on acommunication network, such as, the Internet, local area network, widearea network, or digital broadcast system. FIG. 1 depicts an advertisingsystem 10 that operates in accordance with one embodiment of theinvention. In this embodiment, the Web site 110, the sender networkdevice 120, the recipient network device 130, an advertiser networkdevice 140, and a staff network device 150 are connected to, and cancommunicate through, the Internet 102. It should be appreciated that thenetwork devices depicted in FIG. 1 (i.e., sender network device 120,recipient network device 120, advertiser network device 140, and staffnetwork device 150) are intended to be representative in nature and arenot to be viewed as limitations, either as to the number or type ofnetwork devices utilized in the present invention. Other networkdevices, including, but not limited to, personal computers, televisionset-top boxes, telephone, consumer appliances, personal digitalassistants (PDAs), wireless application protocol (WAP) mobile phones,I-Mode mobile phones, 3G devices, wireless entertainment devices (WEDs),networked game station (e.g., Playstation™, Xbox™), wireless informationdevices (WIDs), digital broadcast devices including all standards ofDVB, and other physical and wireless connected network devices,regardless of their network protocol (e.g., WiFi, Bluetooth, GSM),generally known to those skilled in the art are within the scope andspirit of this invention.

As shown in FIG. 2, the sender network device 120 includes a senderdisplay 122, a Web browser 124, and a sender memory device 126. Therecipient network device 130 includes a recipient display 132, acommunication application 134, and a recipient memory device 136.Finally, the Web site 110 includes a Web server 112, an advertisingapplication 114, and a Web site memory device 116. The advertisingapplication 114, operating on the Web site 110, permits a sender tocreate, and send a personal communication containing a sender-selectedadvertisement to the communication application 134, operating on therecipient network device 130. For an e-mail message, the communicationapplication 134 may be an e-mail application (e.g., a POP3 or IMAPserver), whereas for social-networking messages, the communicationapplication 134 may be a Web browser. The personal communicationreceived by the communication application 134 may be displayed on therecipient display 132 or stored in the recipient memory device 136. Itshould be appreciated that the memory and display devices depicted inFIG. 2 are intended to be representative in nature, and otherembodiments are within the scope and spirit of this invention. Thememory devices depicted in FIG. 2 (i.e., sender memory device 126,recipient memory device 126, and Web site memory device 116) can be longor short term data storage devices, including, but not limited to, RAM,cache memory, flash memory, magnetic disks, optical disks, removabledisks, SCSI disks, IDE hard drives, SATA hard drives, holographicstorage devices, tape drives, smart cards, and all other types of datastorage devices (and combinations thereof, such as RAID devices)generally known to those skilled in the art. The display devicesdepicted in FIG. 2 (i.e., sender display 122 and recipient display 132)can be a video monitor, television, LCD/plasma flat screen, LED, OLE, orany other display devices generally known to those skilled in the art.

The sender network device 120 is used to send a personal communication,together with a sender-selected advertisement, to the recipient networkdevice 130 via the Web site 110. Alternatively, the sender networkdevice 120 is used to upload a digital message to the Web site 110,where the message is published and later viewed or downloaded by therecipient network device 130. It should be appreciated that a digitalmessage can include, but is not limited to, an e-mail message, textmessage, short message service (SMS) message, multimedia messagingservice (MMS) message, blog message, chat-room message, instantmessaging message, video message, video calling message, voice or audiomessage, and any other personalized network communications generallyknown to those skilled in the art. Additionally, the personalcommunication can contain message data including, but not limited to,text data, graphic data, audio data, image or video data, and all othertypes of electronically transmitted data generally known to thoseskilled in the art. The sender-selected advertisement that is containedwithin the personal communication can either be static or interactive. Astatic advertisement is an icon, graphic, text message, voice message,or video message that is intended to provide the recipient with a simplemessage, wherein the simple message can be obtained by viewing and/orhearing the static advertisement. An interactive advertisement is anicon, graphic, text, or voice message that can be interacted with toprovide the recipient with additional communication data, wherein theadditional communication data is provided to the recipient when therecipient interacts with the advertisement. It should be appreciatedthat the types of additional communication data include, but are notlimited to, text data, digital image data, voice data, video data, andall other types of electronically transmitted data generally known tothose skilled in the art.

FIG. 3 is a more detailed drawing of a preferred embodiment of theadvertising application 114 running on the network application server.The advertising application 114 comprises a context server 220, anadvertising selection server 222, and an advertising insertion server224, which will each be described in more detail below. It should beappreciated that the advertising application is a logical collection ofservers that may reside on a single network server or on a number ofservers linked together using a network protocol such as TCP/IP. Indescribing the functionality of the system depicted in FIG. 3, thecontributor of a digital message will be assumed to be a user of aweb-enabled mobile phone who is reading and responding to messagesdisplayed on a blog hosted on an internet Web site. However, it shouldbe understood that the advertising application is equally applicable tousers of personal computers or other network devices sending e-mail,visiting an online social networking site, or accessing any other formof network application server. A flow chart of these operations appearsin FIG. 4, and the numerical labels in the description below refer toelements of the block diagram depicted in FIG. 3 and the flow chartdepicted in FIG. 4.

In this example, the user (contributor) has logged into a messagingapplication server 226 that is hosting a blog. The contributor wishes topost a message in reply to something he has read. He composes a messageand sends it to the messaging application server 226, as shown in step250. The messaging application server communicates with the advertisingapplication 114, sending contextual information to the context server220, in step 254, and requesting an advertising palette from theadvertising selection server 222, in step 252. The contextualinformation sent to the context server 220 includes the contributor'sprofile data, comprising demographic information and historical useinformation, the recipient's profile data (in this case, profile dataabout the author of the posting the contributor is responding to),geographic information about the contributor and recipient, which may bederived from GPS, A-GPS, mobile phone number look-up, or other mobilewireless location services, and message-based context informationderived from the contents of the digital message itself. The contextserver 220 analyzes and scores the contextual information and receiveslists of possible advertisements from the advertising channels server232, as shown in step 256. The context server 220 sends this informationto the advertising selection server 222 which then uses this informationto create a palette of advertisements that are most relevant to thecontextual information collected, as shown in step 258.

For example, assume that the advertising channel server 232 containsadvertisements from three sources: a restaurant, a digital music playermanufacturer, and a running shoe company. Each company that advertisesalso provides profiles of the kinds of information it is looking for.For example, each advertiser will provide a milieu, or general socialsetting for its advertisements. Each will also provide keywords thatmight be associated with interest in the particular product. Someadvertisers may be interested in particular local markets and willprovide location data. For example, a restaurant may want to targetcustomers within a particular distance of one of its locations. Eventorganizers may wish to target customers residing in the area near ascheduled event. Others may be interested in particular pieces ofinformation, for example, a digital music player manufacturer may beinterested in the musical taste of its customers and may want to tailorits advertisements according to those tastes. The context server 220evaluates the contextual data based on contributor and recipientprofiles and digital message context and calculates a parameterizeddistance to each of the advertisements obtained from the advertisingchannels server 232. The advertising palette presented to thecontributor, step 258, thus contains advertisements that are preselectedto optimize as far as possible the contextual matches. The contributorthen selects one of these advertisements to accompany his digitalmessage and posts his message to the blog messaging application server226, as shown in step 260. The advertising insertion server 224 thenformats an advertisement based on the contributor's selection, as shownin step 262. The advertising insertion server may then physicallycombine the digital message and the selected advertisement, in step 264,or may generate an alternate hyperlink such that when the reader of thedigital content attempts to access the content, he is first directed tothe advertising insertion server which displays the selectedadvertisement to the user before returning him to the messagingapplication server 226, which serves the digital message, as shown insteps 266 and 268. Though FIGS. 3 and 4 have been explained in thecontext of a mobile phone user accessing a blog, those skilled in theart will recognize that this method is equally applicable to othernetwork devices and to other network application servers, such as e-mailservers, online social network servers, and servers hosting virtualworld networks.

In addition, the advertising selection application could exist as amobile phone application or desktop application. As such, it wouldreceive information over a Web-based network protocol, but would alsoallow the insertion of an advertisement or a link to an advertisementinto live video streams of video calls. Likewise the application wouldallow the insertion of an advertisement or a link to an advertisementinto live audio streams.

FIG. 5 depicts one example of an advertising palette that may bepresented to a contributor of a digital message by the advertisingselection server 222. In this palette, advertiser's products arearranged along the horizontal axis where we see products being offeredby a digital mp3 music player manufacturer, a running shoe manufacturer,a restaurant, a home mortgage broker, and a video game manufacturer.Along the vertical axis are several market segments corresponding to anunder-thirty age group, and over-fifty age group, a male classification,a female classification, and a married individual classification. Thesecategories and products, of course, are merely illustrative of one typeof breakdown that might be represented in the advertising palette. Atthe intersection of each row and column, an advertiser may have placedan advertisement that was specifically selected for that particularmarket segment. For example, the mp3 manufacturer has selected one typeof advertisement for a specific product or model, which may depict youngpeople listening to rap music, as the advertisement suggested for theunder-thirty market segment, and it has selected another advertisementfor the over-fifty segment, which might feature people listening toclassical music. The video game manufacturer, on the other hand, hasselected the same advertisement for use with the under-thirty marketsegment and the male market segment. It has selected no advertisementsfor the female market segment or the over-fifty market segments.Presented with a palette like this one, a contributor may quickly searchthrough available advertisements and select one that is particularlywell aligned with the specific digital message he is creating.

In addition to providing the contributor of a digital message with aconvenient and easily navigable interface for selecting advertisements,the advertising palette depicted in FIG. 5 also enables an efficientsystem for more precisely targeting advertising based on a combinationof human and machine selection of advertisements. For example, FIG. 5depicts a number of advertisements provided by a restaurant company. Thecompany may own a number of different restaurant chains, includinglow-priced family restaurants, up-scale gourmet restaurants, andrestaurants featuring live music. The restaurant corporation mightdetermine that advertisements for its family restaurants are besttargeted to a married population, its gourmet restaurants are besttargeted to an over-50 population, and its restaurants with live musicare best targeted to an under-30 population. It would allow theadvertisement generator to organize its advertisements accordinglywithin the palette by including metadata identifying market segmentswith which to associate each advertisement. The contributor of a digitalmessage may decide to select an advertisement from this restaurantcompany to appear with his digital message, but may decide to selectonly the restaurant company and not the particular restaurant to beadvertised. If the digital message were an e-mail, the advertisementgenerator would look up demographic information regarding the recipient,if the recipient were a registered user, and then select the particularadvertisement, from among the advertisements provided by the restaurantcompany, that was best aligned with the demographics of the recipient.In the case of a recipient that was not a registered user, theadvertisement generator would supply a default advertisement. Similarly,if the digital message provided by the contributor were a blog posting,the advertisement generator would dynamically choose the particularadvertisement to display with the blog posting at the time a registereduser logged into the network server hosting the blog. Thus registeredusers logging in to read the posted blog message would seeadvertisements tailored to their particular demographic profile.

The advertisements presented to the contributor may be provided directlyby third party advertisers, may be created by the advertisementgenerator, or may be provided by the contributor himself. FIG. 6 depictsone embodiment of the invention by which a contributor is permitted toprovide advertisements to the advertisement generator by copying ordragging them from other locations on the Internet. For example, acontributor may see an advertisement that appeals to him on a blog he isreading or may receive an advertisement in an e-mail that he would liketo use with his own digital messages. If the owner of that advertisementparticipates in this method of distributing its advertisements, thecontributor would be able to copy or drag this advertisement from theInternet location at which it appears to the advertisement generator inorder to make it available for inclusion with the contributor's digitalmessages. FIG. 6 depicts a representative Internet site 2002 on whichappears an advertisement 2006 that the contributor desires to includewith a current or future digital message. The contributor drags theadvertisement 2006 to a widget associated with the advertisementgenerator 2008. The advertisement generator then attaches the selectedadvertisement to a digital message provided by the contributor or storesit in the advertising palette for future use. In order to participate inthis method of distribution, an advertiser registers with theadvertisement generator to provide compensation data, preferred audiencedemographic and location data, an expiration date, and other relevantinformation. It would create a unique identification number to beassociated with each type of advertisement it wishes to distribute inthis way. When a contributor of a digital message viewed such anadvertisement on the Internet, he would be able to copy or drag theadvertisement to the network server hosting the advertisement generator,and the advertisement generator would incorporate the advertisement intothe advertising palette or alternatively insert it directly into adigital message provided by the contributor. The unique identificationnumber would be passed to the advertisement generator to enableidentification of the owner of the advertisement and to accesscompensation data, demographic and location data, and expiration dateinformation. The advertisement generator would then attach theadvertisement to the contributor's digital message directly, or wouldattach a hyperlink that a recipient would follow in order to access thedigital message and the advertisement. The advertisement generator wouldmodify the target of the hyperlink as needed in order that thecontributor would be compensated for including the advertisement withhis digital message.

The flow diagram depicted in FIG. 6 illustrates the process of copyingor dragging advertisements located on the Internet to the advertisementgenerator. In this implementation, the advertisement generator uses awidget, or a piece of executable code that may be written in JavaScriptor Flash or similar programming language, to receive and process theinformation dragged by the contributor from somewhere on the Internet tothe advertisement generator, as indicated in step 2010. The widget wouldidentify the Uniform Resource Locator (URL) of the advertisementselected by the contributor to verify that it is a valid URL and wouldpass along the unique identification number associated with theadvertisement to the advertisement registration server, as shown in step2012. The advertisement registration server would then be able to pullup information provided by the owner of the advertisement, includingcompensation data, as shown in step 2014, and would modify theclick-through URL in order to enable compensation of the contributorselecting the advertisement. The advertisement registration server wouldthen be able to retrieve applicable updates for the advertisement andmetadata from the owner of the advertisement, as illustrated in step2016. The advertisement registration server would then pass the newclick-through link to the advertisement generator, as shown in step2018, and the advertisement generator would then serve the advertisementto a media viewer, such as a Web browser or mobile phone, which wouldrender the advertisement and display it to a user, as shown in step2020. When a reader of the contributed digital message then clicked onthe advertising link, as shown in step 2022, the click-through linkwould allow the advertisement registration server to log the event,shown in step 2024, allowing the contributor of the message to becompensated for including the advertisement, and the reader would beredirected to the advertisement page, as shown in step 2026.

In another embodiment, the function of importing an advertisement fromanother location on the Internet is performed using a plugin orextension that operates with the Web browser used to navigate theInternet. This allows the advertisement generator to insertadvertisements into arbitrary applications or as part of mashups withoutrequiring any technical or commercial cooperation from the serviceproviders. In this case, the modification of the advertisement URL toredirect a user to the click-through link would be performed by a pluginor extension of the Web browser when the user drags or copies anadvertisement from elsewhere on the Internet to a text-entry fielddisplayed on the Web browser.

The advertising application is, of course, also well suited to an e-mailapplication server. FIG. 7 depicts an e-mail message 302 directed to arecipient. The e-mail message contains a personal message 304 and asender-selected advertisement 306. If the sender-selected advertisement306 is a static advertisement, then the recipient will merely have anopportunity to view the advertisement as provided in the e-mail. If thesender-selected advertisement 306 is an interactive advertisement, thenthe recipient will also have an opportunity to interact with theadvertisement to receive additional communication data. It shouldfurther be appreciated that advertisement (either static orinteractive), as well as any additional communication data, can beprovided by the sender of the personal communication, by a third partyadvertiser, by the Web site, or by any other party that has access tothe Internet. For example, the sender, in an attempt to share somehumor, may send a personal communication to a recipient containing aninteractive, sender-provided, advertisement that advertises an animatedcartoon. If the recipient interacts with the interactive advertisement,the recipient will be provided with additional communication data (e.g.,graphic, text, audio, video) pertaining to the animated cartoon.Alternatively, the sender, for either esthetic or compensatory reasons,may send a personal communication to a recipient containing aninteractive, third party advertiser-provided, advertisement thatadvertises Nike™. If the recipient interacts with the interactiveadvertisement, the recipient will be provided with additionalcommunication data (e.g., graphic, text, audio, video) pertaining toNike™. It should be appreciated that these examples are not intended tolimit the subject matter of the additional communication data that canbe provided to the recipient network device. The additionalcommunication data can contain advertisement data, entertainment data,educational data, or any other type of data made available to the Website.

To send a personal communication containing an advertisement to arecipient, the sender would interface to the Web site 110 via the sendernetwork device 120. Specifically the Web browser 124, operating on thesender network device 120, interfaces over the Internet 102 with the Webserver 112, which is operating on the Web site 110. If the sender hasnot used the Web site 110 before, data may be displayed on the senderdisplay 122 prompting him to register. Registration may includeproviding data, such as name, e-mail address, mailing address, andprofile information. After registration is complete, a user name andpassword would be sent to the e-mail address provided by the sender. Thesender then uses the user name and password to access a communicationpage on the Web site 110.

If the sender indicates a desire to send an e-mail message to arecipient, he may be provided with an e-mail communication page 402, asshown in FIG. 8. It should be appreciated that other communication pagesspecifically designed for sending text messages, SMS messages, blogcommentary, chat-room messages, instant messaging messages, videomessages, voice messages, and other personal communications are withinthe sprit and scope of this invention. The e-mail communication page 402provides a recipient space 408 where the sender can designate at leastone recipient that will receive the e-mail. The sender is furtherprovided a subject space 406 and a message space 410, where the subjectmatter and the contents of the e-mail can be added. The e-mailcommunication page 402 may also provide the sender with an attach filebutton 412, which allows the sender to attach separate files to thee-mail that are to be routed to the designated recipient(s). The e-mailcommunication page 402 further provides a pull down menu 404 forselecting an advertisement that is to be included within the e-mail. Thepull down menu 404 gives the sender the ability to choose anadvertisement from a palette of advertisements assembled by theadvertising server, as outlined in FIGS. 3 and 4.

A sender is allowed to modify the palette of advertisements stored inthe Web site memory device 116 (see FIG. 2). The palette containsadvertisements that the sender has previously selected as well as thoseselected by the advertising application 114. The sender may have theoption of adding additional advertisements to the palette and removingadvertisements from the palette. Additionally, the advertisingapplication, the third party advertisers, or the Web site staff may alsohave the ability to remove advertisements from the sender's palette(e.g., upon the expiration of an advertisement). Further, theadvertising application may alter the palette of advertisementspresented to the sender based on the content of the digitalcommunication. The advertising application can scan the content of thecontributed message and add or subtract advertisements from the palettedepending on the closeness of the contextual match. The advertisingapplication may also alter the palette of advertisements based upon theselected recipient of the communication. When the sender enters arecipient address in the destination window 408, the advertisingapplication will search its database of user profiles to determinewhether the recipient is a registered user and whether user profileinformation exists for that user. If such information exists, theadvertising application will add or remove advertisements from thesender's palette to include those most likely to align with the user'sinterests and to remove those most likely to offend the user. To aid inthe adding of advertisements to the sender's palette, the sender will beable to choose from available advertisements that are stored in the Website memory device 116 (see FIG. 2). The available advertisements aresorted by category and market segment, as described in FIG. 5, makingthem easier for the sender to locate. The categories may include, butare not limited to, advertising source, product category, compensationvalue, popularity, product name, or date added. Once the sender has apalette of advertisements, those particular advertisements will bedisplayed to the sender through the pull down menu 404. The sender hasthe option, through the pull down menu 404, to select an advertisementto accompany the e-mail, select that no advertisement is to accompanythe e-mail, or select that an advertisement should be randomly selected,using the random choice button 416, either from the sender's palette orfrom the available advertisements, to accompany the e-mail.

At this point, the sender can depress the send message button 414 tosend the e-mail (which includes the attachment(s) and the selectedadvertisement) to the designated recipient(s). The reply-to datacontained in the e-mail, which is the e-mail address that is used if therecipient depressing the “reply-to” button on their e-mail client (e.g.,Microsoft Outlook™), is replaced with the e-mail address provided by thesender upon registration. This allows replies (using the “reply-to”button) to e-mails to be routed directly to the sender's provided e-mailaddress. The e-mail will appear to the recipient as if it came from ane-mail advertisement service provider's domain. If the recipientattempts to route an e-mail reply to the listed address, the advertisingapplication 114 (see FIG. 2) will re-route the e-mail to the sender'sprovided e-mail address.

Referring back to FIG. 2, data pertaining to the sender's e-mail will bestored in the Web site memory device 116 at approximately the time ane-mail is routed to the designated recipient(s), or when a chat-room orblog message is posted to a server. This data may include, but is notlimited to, message data (pertaining to the personal communication),sender data (pertaining to the sender), advertisement data (pertainingto the sender-selected advertisement), and identification numbersassociated with each group of data. The sender data and theadvertisement data (or their identification numbers) will allow theadvertising application 114 to keep track of the advertisements that arebeing selected, and the senders that are sending those advertisements.The message data, which is linked to the sender data and theadvertisement data, allows the advertising application 114 to provideadditional communication data to a recipient that interacts with aninteractive advertisement (discussed below).

In another embodiment of the invention, the sender may submit apopulated communication page as additional communication data (asopposed to personal communication data). In this instance, theadvertising application 114 generates a personal communication directedto a sender-provided recipient. The personal communication is sentcontaining a sender-selected advertisement that is adapted to provide aninteracting recipient with additional communication data (i.e., thepopulated communication page). The sender-provided recipient and thesender-selected advertisement may be provided by the sender or extractedby the advertising application 114 from the sender-submitted populatedcommunication page. For example, if a sender submitted a populatede-mail communication page as additional communication data, then theadvertising application 114 would generate a personal communicationdirected to the recipient contained within the populated e-mailcommunication page. The advertising application 114 would then create aninteractive advertisement from data contained within the populatede-mail communication page (e.g., sender name, subject matter, content).The personal communication, containing the interactive advertisement,would be routed to the recipient network device 130. If the recipientinteracted with the interactive advertisement, the recipient would beprovided with the populated e-mail communication page submitted by thesender.

As previously discussed, the advertisement, as well as the additionalcommunication data may be provided by a variety of sources (e.g., senderof the personal communication, third party advertiser, or Web site). Ifa sender-selected advertisement is provided by a third party advertiser,then the sender of that advertisement is compensated for sending it toat least one recipient or for publishing it to a blog or chat-roomserver. Additional compensation may be awarded to the sender if therecipient who receives the advertisement interacts with it. The sendermay also receive additional compensation if the recipient purchases agood or service from the advertiser after interacting with theinteractive advertisement. It should be appreciated that compensationincluding, but not limited to, money, products, services, software,information, points that are redeemable for goods or services, and otherforms of compensation generally known to those skilled in the art arewithin the scope and spirit of this invention.

FIG. 9 outlines, beginning at step 502, the process the advertisingapplication goes through to provide the recipient network device with adigital message containing an advertisement. At step 504, theadvertising application provides a Web page containing a “send e-mail”option to the sender network device. The advertising application, atstep 506, receives a response from the sender network device indicatingthat an e-mail should be sent. At step 508, the advertising applicationprovides the sender network device with an e-mail communication page(see FIG. 8), enabling the sender to enter at least one designatedrecipient, the subject matter, the content, any attachments, and aselected advertisement that should accompany the completed e-mail. Theend result is a compilation of data that includes sender data,advertisement data, and message data. The advertising application, atstep 510, receives a response from the sender network device indicatingthat a compilation of data is being submitted. At step 512, theadvertising application receives the compilation of data, which includesmessage data, sender data, and advertisement data, and assigns a uniqueidentification number to the message data. The compiled data is thenstored in the Web site memory device. The unique identification number,as assigned to the message data, and as previously assigned to thesender data (upon registration of the sender) and the advertisement data(upon submission of the advertisement), enables the advertisingapplication to easily search for individual entries and link individualentries with other individual entries. The advertising application thendetermines the compensation that is due the sender, at step 514, basedupon the selected advertisement and the number of recipients that willreceive the selected advertisement. At step 516, the message data (whichincludes the selected advertisement) is formatted into a standard e-mailformat. The formatted e-mail's reply-to address is changed, at step 518,to reflect the sender's e-mail address that was provided by the senderupon registration. At step 520, the formatted e-mail is sent to thedesignated recipient(s).

Referring back to FIG. 2, assuming the designated recipient is therecipient network device 130, the formatted e-mail is routed from theWeb site 110 to the recipient e-mail server 210, where the e-mail isre-formatted so that it can be read by the recipient network device 130.For example, if the recipient network device is a mobile phone, thee-mail service provider for that mobile phone is set up to re-formatincoming e-mails so they are properly displayed on the mobile phone'sdisplay. In another embodiment of this invention, the Web site 110further includes a system and method for receiving and transmittinge-mails to network devices, regardless of the type of network devicethat is being used. The e-mail server will utilize a POP3, IMAP, orother standard e-mail protocol to receive and store e-mails.Additionally, the same platform independent architecture used intransmitting additional communication data to network devices (asdiscussed below) will be used in connection with the e-mail server, thusallowing e-mails to be transmitted to a variety of network devices,regardless of the different e-mail format requirements. Regardless ofwhich e-mail server is used, the re-formatted e-mail (which contains thesender-selected advertisement) is forwarded on to the communicationapplication 134 operating on the recipient network device 130.

If the advertisement contained in the e-mail is static, it can bedisplayed or performed on the recipient display 132 (which may requirespeakers for performance of audio advertisements). However, if theadvertisement is interactive, and the advertisement is interacted with,additional communication data will be provided to the recipient networkdevice 130. The location of the additional communication data (or apointer to the data) is contained in a URL (or Uniform Resource Locator)embedded within the interactive advertisement. A URL contains a uniqueaddress which fully specifies the location of data on the Internet.Unlike most advertisement URLs that provide data directly from theadvertiser's Web site, the URL embedded within the sender-selectedadvertisement provides the recipient network device 130 with data fromthe Web site 110, and more particularly from the Web site memory device116. This data stored on the Web site memory device 116 may itself bethe additional communication data that is to be provided to therecipient network device 130 or it may contain the address of such data.Regardless, the additional communication data will be provided to therecipient network device 130 by the advertising application 114operating on the Web site 110 using the procedures outlined in FIG. 4.

One embodiment of the advertising application using the Java programminglanguage is shown in FIG. 10. Here, the advertising application 114further contains two sub-applications, referred to as a control servlet602 and a JSP (Java Server Page) 604. It should be noted that the phrase“control servlet” is used here in its generic sense, actually referringto one of many specific servlets operating on the advertisingapplication 114. Additionally, the JSP sub-application 604, as usedhere, is actually referring to one of a plurality JSPs, where each JSPis responsible for performing a specific function for a specific type ofnetwork device. When a recipient interacts with an interactiveadvertisement, the request data (contained in the URL) refers to thecontrol servlet 602. The control servlet 602 uses the request data toretrieve data from the Web site memory device 116, and provide an outputportion of that data to the JSP 604. The output data is then placedwithin the JSP 604 template that has been optimized for the targeted,recipient network device 130.

The flow diagram in FIG. 11 outlines what happens when a recipientinteracts with an interactive advertisement 702. When an interactiveadvertisement is interacted with, as in step 704, request data(contained in the URL) is directed to the control servlet. At step 706,the control servlet calls for additional data, based upon uniqueidentification numbers (e.g., memory ID, sender ID, advertisement ID)contained in the request data, from a database software layer, which hasaccess to the Web site memory device. At step 708, the database softwarelayer provides the additional data to the control servlet in at leastone populated Java Bean. The control servlet, at step 710, uses theoutput data contained in the Java Bean to produce a Page Bean. At step712, the control servlet determines the type of recipient network devicethat made the request. This information is embedded within the HTTPprotocol (HyperText Transport Protocol), which is the standardclient-server protocol used on the World Wide Web, and thus used to sendthe URL request data from the recipient network device to the controlservlet. The control servlet then directs the Page Bean, dataidentifying the type of recipient network device, and control to the JSPat step 714. At step 716, the data contained within the Page Bean isplaced into the JSP template optimized for the recipient network device.The populated JSP template (i.e., template containing additionalcommunication data) is then sent to the recipient network device at step718. This platform independent architecture not only allows additionalcommunication data to be transmitted to an interacting recipient, itallows data to be provided to a variety of network devices, regardlessof the request. The output from the Web site 110 is capable of providingdata to a variety of sender network devices and recipient networkdevices, regardless of whether that data is additional communicationdata, Web page data, audio data, video data, image data, or e-mail data.

Referring back to FIG. 1, the advertiser network device 140 is connectedto, and can communicate through the Internet 102. This enables anadvertiser to communicate with the Web site 110. To do this, theadvertiser is given a user account, which includes a user name andpassword, which allows the advertiser to log on to the Web site 110.Once the advertiser is logged on, the advertiser can use the advertisernetwork device 140 to upload an advertisement to the Web site 110. To dothis, the advertising application 114 provides the advertiser networkdevice 140 with a list of category headings, requesting that theadvertiser register the advertisement under at least one of theseheadings. Once a heading is selected, the advertiser can provide theadvertisement to the advertising application 114. If the advertisementis a textual message, the advertising application 114 allows theadvertiser the option of inputting the textual information that makes upthe advertisement. Alternatively, the advertiser can upload theadvertisement data (e.g., text, icon, graphic, audio). If the advertiserselects to upload data, that data should be provided in an acceptableformat. For example, icon or graphic data could be provided in JPEG,GIF, or any other generally recognizable graphical format. Audio datacould be provided in WAV, MP3, or any other generally recognizable audioformat.

The advertiser should at this time specify whether the advertisement isstatic or interactive. If it is interactive, the additionalcommunication data provided upon interaction, or the location of suchdata, should be provided so that the additional communication data canbe provided to any recipient interacting with the interactiveadvertisement. The advertiser should then provide information regardingthe compensation that is to be paid to senders who include theadvertisement within their personal communication. This information mayinclude, but is not limited to, a date and time when the advertisementshould be made available, an expiration date, a maximum number ofavailable transmissions, a maximum length of time it may be displayed ona bulletin board server, the compensation that is to be paid for eachtransmission or posting, the compensation that is to be paid each time arecipient interacts with the advertisement, and the compensation that isto be paid each time a recipient purchases a good or service afterinteraction.

Additionally, once the advertiser is logged on to the Web site 110, theadvertiser can use the advertiser network device 140 to gatherstatistical data from the Web site memory device 116. This statisticaldata may include, but is not limited to, the number of times anadvertisement has been sent, the number of times an advertisement wasinteracted with, the number (and currency amount) of purchases madeafter an advertisement was interacted with, the profile of senders whoare sending an advertisement, and the compensation that is due for anadvertisement's transmission, interaction, or purchases made thereafter.

As well, the staff network device 150 is also connected to, andcommunicates through the Internet 102. This enables a Web site staffmember to communicate with the Web site 110. To do this, the staffmember is given a user account, which includes a user name and password,allowing the staff member to log on to the Web site 110. Once the staffmember is logged on, the staff member can access Web pages and acquireinformation in order to maintain the Web site and derive systemintelligence. The Web site maintenance includes, but is not limited to,creating, updating, and removing advertiser and sender accounts,updating sender profiles, administering advertisement campaigns,suspending different service areas, and enabling different serviceareas. The reporting of system intelligence includes, but is not limitedto, usage statistics (e.g., CPU load, number of e-mails sent, number ofusers), status of advertising campaigns, and revenue streams.

In an effort to prevent fraud, the advertising application is adapted torun a variety of antifraud programs. Such programs may include, but arenot limited to, sending a user name and password to a sender'sdesignated e-mail account, allowing only one account to be linked to asingle mailing address, and denying compensation to a sender if thesender attempts to send an advertisement more than a pre-determinednumber of times, send more than a pre-determined number ofadvertisements within a pre-determined amount of time, send anadvertisement to a single recipient more than a pre-determined number oftimes, or send more than a pre-determined number of advertisements to asingle recipient within a pre-determined amount of time. It should beappreciated that other fraud and spamming prevention programs generallyknown to those in the art are within the scope and spirit of thisinvention.

The advertising application is also applicable to a system in which amobile client is provided to a mobile sender device, enabling the mobilesender device to send a personal communication containing asender-selected advertisement to a recipient. Traditional mobile(wireless) devices, due to their small screen size, small memorycapacity, and slower data transmission rate, typically requireadditional software to interface effectively with the Internet. Itshould be appreciated that the mobile client could be constructed usingJava, SIM Toolkit, or any modern platform generally known to thoseskilled in the art. In an embodiment of the invention, the mobile clientis constructed using the Java platform.

FIG. 12 shows a mobile sender device 810 containing a variety ofapplications constructed using the Personal Java Platform. It should beappreciated that mobile sender devices include, but are not limited to,wireless application protocol (WAP) mobile phones, I-Mode mobile phones,3G devices, wireless entertainment devices (WED), wireless informationdevices (WID), and other wireless network devices generally known tothose skilled in the art. The mobile sender device 810 contains afactory provided Host Operating System 820, as depicted in FIG. 12.Additionally, the mobile sender device 810 utilizes a variety ofsoftware components that operate on top of the Host Operating System812, in which the software components are either pre-installed ordownloaded by the user of the mobile sender device 810. These softwarecomponents include a Java Virtual Machine 818, a Mobile InformationDevice Environment 816, a Java Phone API 814 (Application ProgrammingInterfaces), and a Java Card API 812. The Java Virtual Machine 818 makesthe mobile sender device 810 platform independent, thus allowing asingle mobile client to be utilized on any mobile sender device. TheMobile Information Device Environment 816 provides a set of tools andAPIs that allow applications and user interfaces to interact with themobile sender device 810. The Java Phone API 814 is utilized to provideaccess to the generic functions of the mobile sender device 810, whereasthe Java Card API 812 is utilized to provide access to the Java VirtualMachine 818 and the capability to store transactions and information.

FIG. 13 depicts an exemplary e-mail client advertising system 30 thatoperates in accordance with one embodiment of the invention. In thisembodiment, the mobile client is an e-mail client that works togetherwith the advertising application 114 (see FIG. 2) to route an e-mailcontaining an advertisement to a recipient network device 130. Themobile sender device 810 is connected to, and communicates through, theInternet 102. This allows the mobile sender device 810 to communicatewith the Web site 110, and more specifically with the advertisingapplication 114 (see FIG. 2). The e-mail client allows the sender toprovide the mobile sender device 810, containing the various softwarecomponents depicted in FIG. 12, with message data and selectedadvertisement data. After the message data and selected advertisementdata is compiled, and the sender has indicated that the compiled datashould be sent, the compiled data (which may include message data,advertisement data, and sender data) is transmitted to the Web site 110.The advertising application 114 (see FIG. 2) stores the compiled data inthe Web site memory device 116 and determines the amount of compensationthat is due the sender. As previously mentioned, if the recipientnetwork device 130 interacts with an interactive advertisement containedwithin the e-mail, the recipient network device 130 will be providedwith additional communication data pertaining to the request datacontained in the URL that is embedded within the interactiveadvertisement.

FIG. 14 depicts an exemplary client advertising system 20 that operatesin accordance with one embodiment of the invention. In this embodiment,the mobile client enables a mobile sender device containing the softwarecomponent depicted in FIG. 12 to transmit a personal communicationcontaining an advertisement to a mobile recipient device via a wirelessnetwork infrastructure. The mobile sender device 810 is connected to andcan communicate through the Internet 102. This allows the mobile senderdevice to communicate with the Web site 110, through the Web server 112.Additionally, the mobile sender device 810 can connect to andcommunicate through a wireless network infrastructure 1012. This allowsthe mobile sender device to transmit a personal communication directlyto a mobile recipient device 1020, without the entire communicationfirst being routed through the Internet. It should be appreciated thatin this embodiment, the personal communications includes communicationssent using a short message service (SMS), a multimedia messaging service(MMS) or any other wireless message sending format generally known tothose skilled in the art.

The client will allow the sender to provide the mobile sender device 810with message data and selected advertisement data. After the messagedata and selected advertisement data is compiled, and the sender hasindicated that the compiled data should be sent, the client willinstruct the mobile sender device 810 to route the personalcommunication, together with the selected advertisement, to the mobilerecipient device 1020 via the wireless network infrastructure 1012. Atapproximately the same time, the client will instruct the mobile senderdevice 810 to upload the message data, advertisement data, and senderdata to the advertising application 114 operating on the Web site 110.The advertising application 114 then stores the data in the Web sitememory device 116 and determines the compensation that is due thesender. If the mobile recipient device 1020 interacts with aninteractive advertisement contained within the personal communication(e.g., SMS), the mobile recipient device 1020 will be provided withadditional communication data pertaining to the request data containedin the URL that is embedded within the interactive advertisement.

A flow diagram in FIG. 15, beginning at step 1102, outlines an exemplaryprocess of routing an SMS or e-mail message containing an advertisementto a recipient device when a sending device utilizes a mobile client togenerate and send the personal communication. At step 1104, it should bedetermined whether the personal communication will be a SMS message thatwill be routed via a wireless network infrastructure, or an e-mailmessage that will be routed via the Internet.

If an SMS message is to be sent to a mobile recipient device, at step1128, the mobile sender device uploads the previously downloaded client.This prompts a control servlet, at step 1130, operating on the Web site,to retrieve the sender's palette of advertisements from the Web sitememory device and transmit the palette in an XML document to the mobilesender device. At step 1132, the palette is received and stored in themobile sender device's memory. The sender then selects, at step 1134,the “send SMS” feature provided by the client, which allows an SMSmessage to be created. At step 1136, the sender selects an advertisementfrom the palette that will accompany the SMS message. The sender thenprovides the client with message data, at step 1138, which may includerecipient data, subject data, and content data. A compilation of data isthen transmitted to a control servlet operating on the Web site, at step1140, which includes message data, sender data, and advertisement data.Another control servlet assigns an ID number to the message data (aspreviously assigned to the sender data and the advertisement data), atstep 1142, and stores all compiled data in the Web site memory device.At step 1144, the advertising application determines the amount ofcompensation that is due the sender based upon the selectedadvertisement and the number of recipients that received theadvertisement. The SMS message, along with the selected advertisement,is sent by the mobile sender device, at step 1146, to the designatedmobile recipient device over a wireless network infrastructure.

In an alternative embodiment, the mobile sender device routes the SMSmessage and the selected advertisement over a wireless networkinfrastructure, where the cost of the transmission is billed to anaccount provided by the Web site. The compensation (or part thereof)normally sent to the sender is kept by the Web site to subsidize thecost of the wireless transmission.

At step 1104, if the sender determines that an e-mail message is to besent via the Internet, the mobile sender device should upload, at step1106, the previously downloaded e-mail client. This prompts a controlservlet, at step 1108, operating on the Web site, to retrieve thesender's palette of advertisements from the Web site memory device andtransmit the palette in an XML document to the mobile sender device. Atstep 1110, the palette is received and stored in the mobile senderdevice's memory. The sender then selects, at step 1112, the “sende-mail” feature provided by the e-mail client, which allows an e-mailmessage to be created. At step 1114, the sender selects an advertisementfrom the palette that will accompany the e-mail message. The sender thenprovides the e-mail client with message data, at step 1116, which mayinclude recipient data, subject data, and content data. A compilation ofdata is then transmitted to a control servlet operating on the Web site,at step 1118, which includes message data, sender data, andadvertisement data. Another control servlet assigns an ID number to themessage data (as previously assigned to the sender data andadvertisement data), at step 1120, and stores all compiled data in theWeb site memory device. At step 1122, the advertising applicationdetermines the amount of compensation that is due the sender based uponthe selected advertisement and the number of recipients that receivedthe advertisement. The e-mail message, along with the selectedadvertisement, is then formatted, at step 1124, into an e-mail format.At step 1126, the formatted e-mail message is sent by the advertisingapplication to the designated recipient network device over theInternet.

In another embodiment of the invention, the additional communicationdata is sent to the recipient network device 130 so that a first portionof the additional communication data can be displayed on the recipientdisplay 132 as soon as the first portion is received by the recipientnetwork device 130. A remaining portion of the additional communicationdata, which is received after the first portion, does not effect thedisplaying of the first portion on the recipient network device 130. Aswell, subsequent portions of the additional communication data, whichtogether make up the remaining portion, can be displayed on therecipient display 132 as soon as each portion is received by therecipient network device 130. If the recipient network device 130 doesnot support such a function, a display client can be provided by the Website 110 in a downloadable format. The display client would enable therecipient network device 130 to display a first portion of additionalcommunication data as it is received, which would be beneficial fordevices with small screens, small memory capabilities, or slow datatransmitting rates.

FIG. 16 depicts an exemplary blog Web site 1202 in accordance with anembodiment of the invention in which a blog author interacts with anadvertising application to associate an advertisement with contributedcontent posted on the Web server. The Web site 1202 is depicted as itwould appear to a reader of the blog. Entries contributed by the authorof the blog appear in display area 1204 organized in reversechronological order. When the blog author submits contributions 1216 forpublication on the Web site, he may select an advertisement 1214 toappear in close proximity to the contributed digital message 1216. Theseadvertisements may be static, or they may be interactive, allowing thereader to request more information by, for example, clicking on text orgraphics appearing in the advertisement. The author is compensated forselecting and including an advertisement along with a digital message.For example, the author may receive free blog hosting services inexchange for associating an advertisement with comments. Readers of theblog are given the opportunity to post comments in reply to the contentsof the blog. By filling in a reply form 120 and providing an identifyinge-mail address 1212, a reader may submit a comment to be posted on theWeb site. Before submitting the comment by selecting the “post reply”button 1208, the user may elect to include an advertisement with theresponse using the “select advertisement” button 1210. When the readerdoes so, the selected advertisement 1220 will appear on the Web sitealong with the submitted comment 1218. An advertising applicationrunning on the server will keep track of advertisements selected anddisplayed by authors and readers of the blog and calculate compensationaccordingly. For example, readers selecting and displaying anadvertisement may receive a larger quota of published comments, or mayhave their comments presented more prominently in exchange for includingan advertisement.

FIG. 17 is a diagram illustrating an exemplary multimedia data-sharingWeb site 1302, where users may post multimedia content, including audio,video, and image files, which may contain embedded advertisements, toshare with other users. Such Web sites may contain a variety of mediaformats as depicted in FIG. 14, or they may include files of only onetype. In general, users of the site wishing to download or streammultimedia content will need to register with the network server andenter login information before being allowed to access content. Thus,the network server will generally have user profile informationavailable about the user accessing a particular file. Multimedia files1304 are presented to the user for download or streaming. Users mayscroll through the available submissions, or may search for particularcontent. When a user selects a file to download or stream, theadvertising application selects an advertisement based upon selectionsmade by the contributor of the file in combination with the savedprofile data of the user downloading the advertisement and associatesthe advertisement with the selected file. Advertisements are indicatedschematically at 1306. In a video file, a video advertisement isappended to the beginning of the contributed video such that a userselecting that video for viewing will first view the embeddedadvertisement. In the case of an image file or photograph 1316, theadvertisement 1318 selected by the contributor is displayed adjacent toor superimposed upon the image file or photograph such that a userviewing the image will also view the advertisement. For audio files1320, contributors are allowed to select audio advertisements 1322 to beassociated with their contributions such that a user accessing the audiocontent will first hear the advertisement and then the audio content.Contributors are invited to share their own multimedia content byproviding a description in a form box 1308, providing an identifyinge-mail address 1310, and uploading a digital file to the Web site usingthe upload function 1312. Contributors may also elect to embed anadvertisement in the uploaded content using the “select advertisement”function 1314. In some cases, users will select a particularadvertisement that is always associated with the uploaded content. Inother cases, a user will select a number of advertisements, any one ofwhich may be associated with the uploaded content at the point ofdownload by a user. In the latter case, the advertising application willuse user profile data associated with the logged-in user in order toselect an advertisement, from among those selected by the contributor,that is best aligned with the user's profile. Contributors selecting andincluding an advertisement or set of advertisements are compensated, forexample, with increased storage space or an increased quota of items forupload.

FIG. 18 illustrates another embodiment of the invention in which usersassociate an advertisement with their personal signatures in addition toor in lieu of associating an advertisement with a particular digitalmessage. Users interact in an online community or online social network,such as MySpace or Facebook, in which they discuss subjects of commoninterest. To identify the author of each post, users select certainsymbols, images, or text to describe themselves. As one of theseidentifying symbols, a user may select a brand name or product logo toassociate with his or her digital signature as a form of personalendorsement. FIG. 18 illustrates two such users who have selectedproduct symbols as part of their identifying information 1404 and 1406.When a contributor wishes to submit a comment using the form box 1408and “submit” function 1412, he may first update the signature associatedwith his account using the “update signature” function 1414. There, thecontributor will have the opportunity to change images and textassociated with his personal identifying information and will also havethe opportunity to select a product logo or brand name if desired. Usersselecting an advertisement as part of their signatures, or to be postedautomatically with their signatures, will receive compensation forincluding the advertisement by receiving services such as increasedallocations for posted comments, more prominent display of theircomments through the use of larger fonts or different colors, or otherforms of compensation.

FIG. 19 illustrates an exemplary flow of data between a contributor of adigital message, a user of a digital message, and the advertisingapplication, according to another embodiment of the present invention.The contributor 1508 of a digital message 1512 sends the message data tothe advertising application 1506 running on a network server or Website. The message may be intended for publication on the Web site as ablog entry or as a comment to another online posting, or it may beintended as a personal communication directed to a specific recipient.In the case of a personal message to a specific recipient, thecontributor will also send the name and network address of the recipient1514 to the advertising application 1506. The advertising applicationwill then access previously saved user profile data 1502 correspondingto both the sender 1508 and the recipient 1510, if the recipient is arecognized registered user of the Web site. The user profile dataincludes information provided by the user at the time of registration aswell as information collected by the advertising application wheneverthe user posts a message to the Web site or searches for particularcontent on the Web site. Based upon the user profile data and upon thecontent of the digital message, the advertising application will selecta palette of advertisements from the database of advertisements 1524stored on the Web site memory device 1504 comprising those with thehighest contextual relevance. The advertising application will make thisadvertising palette 1516 available to the contributor of the digitalmessage 1508, and the contributor will make a selection of anadvertisement 1518 from the palette presented by the advertisingapplication. The advertising application will then assemble the digitalmessage along with the selected advertisement, and send this combineddigital data 1522 to the user 1510.

If the digital message is not directed at a particular recipient butrather is intended to be posted to a blog or other Web site featuringuser-contributed content, the contributor will not provide recipientdata to the advertising application. Instead, an advertising palette1516 will be created by the advertising application based on contributordata saved in the user profile 1502 and upon the content of the digitalmessage 1512. The contributor 1508 will be permitted to select multipleadvertisements approved for display with his digital message and willdesignate one as a default. When a user later visits the Web sitehosting the digital message, that user will send user data 1520 to theadvertising application upon logging in to the Web site. If user datafor that user is saved in the user profile memory 1502, the advertisingapplication will use that data to select which of the advertisements,approved by the contributor, will be displayed to that user. Sincecontent displayed on the Web site can be created dynamically by theadvertising application, different advertisements can be displayed todifferent users, which are identified to the advertising applicationwhen they log in to the Web site. If no user profile data exists forthat user, or if the user is unregistered or visits the site withoutlogging in, the default advertisement selected by the contributor willbe displayed. To encourage registration and logging in by users, the Website will generally provide certain features, such as the ability topost responses, only to logged-in registered users. This method ensuresthat even in the case of more public communications, such as blogmessages, advertisements can be selected based on the characteristics ofparticular individual users.

FIG. 20 depicts an embodiment of this invention operating in the contextof a virtual world displayed on a Web browser 1602. Here, a user hascreated a virtual personality, or avatar 1604 and has personalized theavatar's environment with objects and images 1606 and 1610 designed tobe viewed by other users of this virtual world. From the objectsavailable to customize and personalize this virtual environment, theuser may select an advertisement, an advertising logo, or a brand nameto appear in the avatar's environment. For example, FIG. 19 displays avirtual T-shirt 1606 containing an advertising brand name 1608, and avirtual can of soda 1610 marked with a brand name 1612. In addition,advertisements may be inserted into other forms of media, such as audioand video media displayed within the virtual world. In exchange fordisplaying such an advertisement, the user will receive compensation,which could be in the form of enhanced services, such as an increasedselection of decorative objects. Users of this virtual world may alsocommunicate directly with other users, for example, by using a messagewindow 1614 to enter text, a recipient address window 1622 to enterrecipient addressing information, and a send button 1624 to send themessage. When sending such a message, the sender may elect to include anadvertisement with the message by using the “select advertisement”button 1618. A sender selecting an advertisement to include with apersonal message will be compensated, perhaps by receiving a freeservice. Some decorative objects appearing in the virtual world may berare, for example, the virtual can of soda 1610, and some users willsend such items to other users as virtual gifts. In making such a gift,using the “send virtual gift” button 1620, a sender may choose to send abranded item as a gift to another user. Alternatively, the sender mayselect an advertisement to accompany the virtual gift to the other user.In many such virtual worlds, a user will be required to purchase thesevirtual gifts he plans to send to other users. In exchange for includingan advertisement with his virtual gift, such a user may obtain thevirtual gifts free of charge or for a reduced price.

Having thus described a preferred embodiment of a system and method foradding an advertisement to digital messages, it should be apparent tothose skilled in the art that certain advantages of the system have beenachieved. It should also be appreciated that various modifications,adaptations, and alternative embodiments thereof may be made within thescope and spirit of the present invention. The invention is furtherdefined by the following claims.

1. A digital messaging system comprising: a network host connected to awide area network (WAN), the network host comprising a networkapplication server adapted to communicate with a plurality of networkdevices via the WAN; an advertisement generator operative with thenetwork host; and a memory device connected to the network applicationserver and adapted to store a plurality of advertisements and aplurality of digital messages; wherein the advertisement generator isadapted to: receive a digital message from a contributor and store thedigital message in the memory device; permit the contributor to selectat least one advertisement, from among the plurality of advertisementsstored in the memory device, to be associated with the digital message;associate the at least one selected advertisement with the digitalmessage; receive recipient data from the contributor of the digitalmessage; send the digital message and the at least one selectedadvertisement via the WAN to the recipient; and provide the contributorof the digital message with compensation in exchange for selecting andincluding the at least one selected advertisement with the digitalmessage.
 2. The digital messaging system of claim 1, wherein thecompensation provided to the contributor of the digital message includesat least one of a free service, a discounted service, a cash payment, apayment of points redeemable for services, a payment of pointsredeemable for goods, a free software application, a discounted softwareapplication, a free telecommunication service, a discountedtelecommunication service, a free access to video content, a discountedaccess to video content, a free access to audio content, and adiscounted access to audio content.
 3. The digital messaging system ofclaim 1, wherein the advertisement generator is further adapted toreceive the digital message in the form of at least one of a digitaltext file, a digital audio file, a digital image file, a digital videofile, a digital video stream, and a voice over Internet protocol (VOIP)packet.
 4. The digital messaging system of claim 1, wherein theadvertisement generator is further adapted to store each one of theplurality of advertisements in the form of at least one of a digitaltext file, a digital audio file, a digital image file, a digital videofile, a digital video stream, and a voice over Internet protocol (VOIP)packet.
 5. The digital messaging system of claim 1, wherein theadvertisement generator is further adapted to aid the contributor inselecting the at least one advertisement for inclusion with thecontributed digital message by comparing subject matter of the pluralityof advertisements stored in the memory device with subject matter of thedigital message.
 6. The digital messaging system of claim 1, wherein theadvertisement generator is further adapted to send to the recipient thedigital message and the at least one selected advertisement in the formof a hyperlink that the recipient must follow to access the digitalmessage and the selected advertisement.
 7. The digital messaging systemof claim 6, wherein the advertisement generator is further adapted tocompensate the contributor of the digital message when the recipientfollows the hyperlink to access the digital message and the selectedadvertisement.
 8. The digital messaging system of claim 6, wherein theadvertisement generator is further adapted to compensate the contributorof the digital message when the recipient concludes a transactionrelating to an item that is a subject of the selected advertisement. 9.The digital messaging system of claim 1, wherein the advertisementgenerator is further adapted to register the contributor and therecipient by collecting personal information and storing the personalinformation in the memory device.
 10. The digital messaging system ofclaim 9, wherein the collected personal information includesgeographical location information about the contributor and about therecipient.
 11. The digital messaging system of claim 9, wherein theadvertisement generator is further adapted to aid the contributor inselecting the at least one advertisement for inclusion with thecontributed digital message by comparing subject matter of the pluralityof advertisements stored in the memory device with the personalinformation stored in the memory device.
 12. A digital messaging systemcomprising: a network host connected to a wide area network (WAN), thenetwork host comprising a network application server adapted tocommunicate with a plurality of network devices via the WAN; anadvertisement generator operative with the network host; and a memorydevice connected to the network application server and adapted to storea plurality of advertisements and a plurality of digital messages;wherein the advertisement generator is adapted to: receive a digitalmessage from a contributor and store the digital message in the memorydevice; permit the contributor to select at least one advertisement,from among the plurality of advertisements stored in the memory device,to be associated with the digital message; associate the at least oneselected advertisement with the digital message; publish the digitalmessage and the at least one selected advertisement on the network hostsuch that the digital message and the selected advertisement can beaccessed via the WAN by at least one user; and provide the contributorof the digital message with compensation in exchange for selecting andincluding the at least one selected advertisement with the digitalmessage.
 13. The digital messaging system of claim 12, wherein thecompensation provided to the contributor of the digital message includesat least one of a free service, a discounted service, a cash payment, apayment of points redeemable for services, a payment of pointsredeemable for goods, a free software application, a discounted softwareapplication, a free telecommunication service, a discountedtelecommunication service, a free access to video content, a discountedaccess to video content, a free access to audio content, and adiscounted access to audio content.
 14. The digital messaging system ofclaim 12, wherein the advertisement generator is further adapted toreceive the digital message in the form of at least one of a digitaltext file, a digital audio file, a digital image file, a digital videofile, and a digital video stream.
 15. The digital messaging system ofclaim 12, wherein the network host publishing the digital messagecomprises at least one of an online bulletin board, a blog, a multi-userchat platform, and an online social network;
 16. The digital messagingsystem of claim 12, wherein the advertisement generator is adapted toallow the at least one user accessing the digital message to publish aresponding digital message and to select at least one respondingadvertisement to be displayed with the responding digital message. 17.The digital messaging system of claim 16, wherein the advertisementgenerator is further adapted to provide the at least one user withcompensation in exchange for selecting the at least one respondingadvertisement to be displayed with the responding digital message. 18.The digital messaging system of claim 12, wherein the advertisementgenerator is further adapted to aid the contributor in selecting the atleast one advertisement for inclusion with the contributed digitalmessage by comparing subject matter of the plurality of advertisementsstored in the memory device with subject matter of the digital message.19. The digital messaging system of claim 12, wherein the advertisementgenerator is further adapted to register the contributor and the atleast one user by collecting personal information and storing thepersonal information in the memory device.
 20. The digital messagingsystem of claim 19, wherein the collected personal information includesgeographical location information about the contributor and about the atleast one user.
 21. The digital messaging system of claim 19, whereinthe advertisement generator is further adapted to aid the contributor inselecting the at least one advertisement for inclusion with thecontributed digital message by comparing subject matter of the pluralityof advertisements stored in the memory device with the personalinformation stored in the memory device.
 22. The digital messagingsystem of claim 12, wherein the advertisement generator is furtheradapted to allow the contributor to identify himself by selecting atleast one of a product logo and a product brand name to be displayedadjacent to the published digital message.
 23. The digital messagingsystem of claim 16, wherein the advertisement generator is furtheradapted to allow the at least one user to identify himself by selectingat least one of a product logo and a product brand name to be displayedadjacent to the responding digital message.
 24. A digital messagingsystem comprising: a network host connected to a wide area network(WAN), the network host comprising a network application server adaptedto communicate with a plurality of network devices via the WAN; avirtual world application server operative with the network host; anadvertisement generator operative with the network host; and a memorydevice connected to the network application server and adapted to storea plurality of advertisements, and a plurality of virtual objects;wherein the virtual world application server is adapted to host avirtual world; wherein the advertisement generator is adapted to:receive a virtual object from a contributor and store the virtual objectin the memory device; permit the contributor to select at least oneadvertisement, from among the plurality of advertisements stored in thememory device, to be associated with the virtual object; permit thedisplay of the virtual object and the associated selected advertisementwithin the virtual world hosted on the virtual world application serversuch that it can be accessed by at least one other user of the virtualworld; provide the contributor of the virtual object with compensationin exchange for selecting and including the at least one selectedadvertisement with the virtual object.
 25. The digital messaging systemof claim 24, wherein the compensation provided to the contributor of thevirtual object includes at least one of a free service, a discountedservice, a cash payment, a payment of points redeemable for services, apayment of points redeemable for goods, a free software application, adiscounted software application, a free telecommunication service, adiscounted telecommunication service, a free access to video content, adiscounted access to video content, a free access to audio content, adiscounted access to audio content, a free virtual object, and adiscounted virtual object.
 26. The digital messaging system of claim 24,wherein the advertisement generator is further adapted to compensate thecontributor for sending the virtual object including the selectedadvertisement to the at least one other user of the virtual world
 27. Ina digital messaging system comprising: a network host connected to awide area network (WAN), the network host comprising a networkapplication server adapted to communicate with a plurality of networkdevices via the WAN; an advertisement generator operative with thenetwork host; and a memory device connected to the network applicationserver and adapted to store a plurality of advertisements and aplurality of digital messages; a method of selecting an advertisement toassociate with a digital message comprising: receiving a digital messagefrom a contributor and storing the digital message in the memory device;creating a palette of advertisements from among the advertisementsstored in the memory device that are relevant to subject matter of thedigital message, and presenting the palette to the contributor of thedigital message; permitting the contributor to select at least oneadvertisement, from among the advertisements compiled in the palette, tobe associated with the digital message; making the digital message andthe at least one selected advertisement accessible to at least onerecipient over the WAN; and providing the contributor of the digitalmessage with compensation in exchange for selecting and including the atleast one selected advertisement with the digital message.
 28. Themethod of claim 27, further comprising compensating the contributor ofthe digital message with at least one of a free service, a discountedservice, a cash payment, a payment of points redeemable for services, apayment of points redeemable for goods, a free software application, adiscounted software application, a free telecommunication service, adiscounted telecommunication service, a free access to video content, adiscounted access to video content, a free access to audio content, anda discounted access to audio content.
 29. The method of claim 27,further comprising compensating the contributor of the digital messageat such time as at least one of: when the contributor grants permissionfor the advertisement to be included with the digital message, when theat least one recipient interacts with the advertisement associated withthe digital message, and when the at least one recipient concludes atransaction relating to an item that is a subject of the selectedadvertisement.
 30. The method of claim 27, further comprising sortingthe palette of advertisements in accordance with product type and inaccordance with market segment
 31. The method of claim 27, furthercomprising registering the contributor and the at least one recipient bycollecting personal information and storing the personal information inthe memory device.
 32. The method of claim 31, further comprisingselecting advertisements to be included in the palette of advertisementsby comparing subject matter of the plurality of advertisements stored inthe memory device with the personal information stored in the memorydevice.
 33. The method of claim 32, further comprising sorting thepalette of advertisements in accordance with product type and inaccordance with market segment, permitting the contributor to select aproduct type, and selecting the advertisement within the product typeselected by the contributor by matching the market segment with thepersonal information stored in the memory device that is associated withthe at least one recipient.
 34. In a digital messaging systemcomprising: a network host connected to a wide area network (WAN), thenetwork host comprising a network application server adapted tocommunicate with a plurality of network devices via the WAN; anadvertisement generator operative with the network host; and a memorydevice connected to the network application server and adapted to storea plurality of advertisements and a plurality of digital messages; amethod of selecting an advertisement to associate with a digital messagecomprising: receiving a digital message from a contributor and storingthe digital message in the memory device; permitting the contributor toidentify an advertisement appearing on at least one of the WAN and theInternet and to select it to be associated with the digital message;obtaining compensation data from an owner of the selected advertisementappearing on the at least one of the WAN and the Internet andcoordinating compensation to be paid by the owner of the selectedadvertisement appearing on the Internet to the contributor of thedigital message; and making the digital message and the selectedadvertisement accessible to at least one recipient over the WAN.
 35. Themethod of claim 34, further comprising compensating the contributor ofthe digital message with at least one of a free service, a discountedservice, a cash payment, a payment of points redeemable for services, apayment of points redeemable for goods, a free software application, adiscounted software application, a free telecommunication service, adiscounted telecommunication service, a free access to video content, adiscounted access to video content, a free access to audio content, anda discounted access to audio content.
 36. The method of claim 34,further comprising compensating the contributor of the digital messageat such time as at least one of: when the contributor grants permissionfor the advertisement to be included with the digital message, when theat least one recipient interacts with the advertisement associated withthe digital message, and when the at least one recipient concludes atransaction relating to an item that is a subject of the selectedadvertisement.